yurch

I suppose you could mod it in if you really wanted to. While we're on the subject, though, I find it real depressing when the Hermes shoots them down...

I can fly it, but it's feasability took a giant dive with the introduction of the jammed ATGM turret. The old plasma ones were 'dodgeable' provided you weren't trying to land near one.

Yeah, they probably should have more. If only for the reason that taking an infantry squad now is basically wasting your team's time - you're giving up a slot that could be used for a much deadlier AFV or one of the extremely important support vehicles. Sadly, with 25 mins to take the objective, there's better things to do than stalk single tanks around, as fun as it is.

As far as I can figure, the 76mm and 20mm do not have a blast radius, shrapnel effect, screen shake or terramorph ability. They are basically low-performance HEAT rounds on the technical side.

That's... interesting. It's not needed for anything more than aesthetics, I note your cobra turrets don't have that bit anyway.

It carries a 17mm rotary. Useful against infantry and deployables, spamming point defenses, and likely not much else. The Hermes 20mm is an utter chainsaw, the Bacchus on the other hand will be almost helpless versus a Thor. It can only penetrate the rear, and only up close. Then it becomes a stationary Cobra launcher, glowing on the enemy's radar but without the resiliance of its stationary counterpart. The physical launcher is armored poorly enough to be affected by shrapnel, if I recall. And if infantry snuck into the nearby tower...

Since the Galaxy no longer fires in mid-air, the Bacchus is a way to ward off its deployment. Galaxy will be useless as a unstoppable 'combat help' if it can't be pulled in on-demand and on-location. Hermes could concievably cover a Galaxy or Pod drop, but the Hermes 'abuse' complained about requires it to stay highly mobile, not hidden and stationary long enough to drop items. Hermes users rarely call in the Galaxy for support in combat, usually you see this being 'abused' by the slower, longer ranged vehicles. Infantry cover distance fairly well (will outpace at least the Thor with jumps) and there's always the transport option for them. Remember the Bacchus launcher doesn't fire without LOS, so if it's hidden in extreme valleys or blocked by (terrain)walls its utility is diminished. You will know where it is at all times, so terrain and circumstance can be exploited. I've seen you mention the massive discrepancy between attackers and defenders, Dark, and the problem is the options defenders have that attackers don't. This vehicle is the great equalizer in this regard.

I have particular difficulty as infantry in that hide-and-seek map. Unless I pick the camera way up, I have a hard time spotting jammed vehicles, let alone other infantry. Gunnery view has an utter forest of grasses limiting visibility to a few meters. Hit 'hold position' however, and the rest of your squad starts lighting everything up, including the odd walking infantry unit from 4k away. This is most unfortunate, as our combination of allowable settings and large numbers of AI controlled units will never allow this sort of feature to be used reasonably.

Shot velocity and recoil strength are just numbers. A developer could set them to whatever was wanted. The missile thing I suppose is doable, if not a little ugly with the animation. A more interesting question would be how the guidance/locking interface would work.

Yuh. I think having more mobile elements play a factor in the 'objectives' of a game is a good thing.

I don't think smoke is stopping ions. Yes, mines are somewhat needed. I don't particularly mind the mines or thier 'counters'. It's when they're used in an offensive manner that gets me annoyed. With artillery, yes, the best defense is not presenting yourself as a target. But when it's some guy on the other side dealing out pods like halloween candies, it doesn't feel like artillery. It feels like some malicious hand from above is messing with you. With the ability to destroy the pods to stop the mines, at least then I can at least blame my accuracy. However, anything that can hamstring the bots so easily is a problem we need to look into.

Well, I wouldn't call "Crimson's tactics" a total solution. Weapons smaller than 120mm HE(which you only get 10 of and can damage friendly tires) can't clear mines, bots will waste huge amounts of equipment and often get stuck due to pathfinding, and most units can't point straight up.

I must add that the ice mountain map is terrible for bots, they hardly ever make it to the center. Add mines and they're beyond worthless. It should probably be taken out of the rotation.

Just tested it on ice fields - when the tower 'kills' the pods, it just makes them come down faster, making mine-pods absolutely the most effective "artillery" to date. I can deplete the defender's inventory of Thors before the attackers even make it to the base.

Anyone else finding these things incredibly annoying? They can be used to stealth-kill all your bots, many vehicles don't have timely defenses against the mines or the pods, and even worse, the pods always seem to drop thier mines - if you destroy them or not. I can see these things becoming a problem.